Download B-25J bombers in final assembly at the Kansas City plant, 1944.

B-25J bombers in final assembly at the Kansas City plant, 1944.
244
KANSAS HISTORY
“WE ALL HAD A CAUSE”
Kansas City’s
Bomber Plant, 1941–1945
by Richard Macias
T
he B-25 bomber played a critical role in America’s World War II arsenal,
serving in several theaters of the war, from North African deserts to Pacific
Ocean expanses. Although a conventional bomber, this versatile aircraft also
was utilized for airborne artillery and as a low altitude strafer. Many of
these B-25s were produced in North American Aviation’s Kansas City, Kansas, facility, and this article describes the origin and development of that defense plant, as well
as the principal achievements of its employees, who made vital contributions to the
war effort.
The Second World War began in Europe in September 1939 when Adolf Hitler’s
Germany attacked Poland. The attacker’s superiority in both numbers of men and
quality of materiel resulted in a swift victory. In the spring of 1940 Hitler’s forces occupied Denmark; Norway was next to fall, primarily due to German control of the air
over the fighting zone. Then on May 10, 1940, Germany launched its biggest offensive
yet by striking at France and the Low Countries of Holland, Belgium, and Luxemburg. The German land forces advanced swiftly, utilizing tanks and other motorized
elements, and striking with its main weight from the Ardennes Forest, which the Allies least expected. The German air force (Luftwaffe) attacked forward Allied airfields,
destroying aircraft on the ground and putting bases out of service. In one instance, on
Richard Macias holds a bachelor's degree in general studies from the University of Kansas. A longtime Kansas
City area firefighter, his research interests include World War II aviation, particularly the American and British contributions toward the Allied victory.
Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains 28 (Winter 2005 –2006): 244 –261.
“WE ALL HAD A CAUSE”
245
the second day of the offensive, an entire British bomber
squadron near Rheims, France, was wiped out before its
first mission could be flown.1 The Luftwaffe swept the
skies of opposing planes; on May 14 alone eighty-nine Allied fighters and bombers were shot down. The German
air arm also provided close support to the army, as demonstrated near Sedan, France, when the French posts on the
Meuse River were subjected to a terrible pounding by
bombers and dive-bombers.2 Within days seven panzer divisions had broken through the Ardennes sector and were
closing on the English Channel ports, effectively cutting
off the better part of the Allied armies. In little over three
weeks from the first German attack on May 10, the Low
Countries were overrun, the British Expeditionary Force
and other Allied soldiers were leaving the continent from
Dunkirk port, and France was headed toward certain defeat.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt watched the events in
Europe, as he did the ominous developments in the Far
East where Japan moved against China. Cognizant of
America’s low level of military preparedness, in light of
these threatening events, the president believed the nation
must modernize and expand its armed forces. And events
in Europe had demonstrated that air power had to be a primary component. FDR knew the Luftwaffe had played a
decisive role in the Allied defeat in Norway and that its superiority in both numbers and technology was having a
profound impact on the combat in continental Europe.3 On
May 16, 1940, the president asked Congress for an increase
in defense spending. He also said he would “like to see this
nation geared up to the ability to turn out at least 50,000
planes a year.” To appreciate the scope of the proposed
program, it must be noted that in 1939 a total of 5,856 aircraft had been produced in the United States. President
Roosevelt envisaged an airplane industry that would meet
American defense needs and fill future orders expected to
come from the Allied powers.4
1. Cajus Bekker, The Luftwaffe War Diaries: The German Air Force in
World War II (New York : DaCapo Press, 1994), 114–15.
2. Ibid., 117–19.
3. Warren F. Kimball, ed., Churchill and Roosevelt : The Complete Correspondence: I Alliance Emerging (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University
Press, 1984), 37; Orville H. Bullitt, ed., For the President: Personal and Secret
Correspondence Between Franklin D. Roosevelt and William C. Bullitt (Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Co., 1972), 419; “British Had To Retreat,” Kansas City
Times, May 9, 1940.
4. “To Meet Brutal Force,” Kansas City Star, May 16, 1940; John B.
Rae, Climb to Greatness : The American Aircraft Industry, 1920–1960 (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1968), 81.
246
I
n the summer of 1940 Congress passed large army and
navy appropriation bills, a supplemental defense bill,
and a tax law to help pay for it all. Concurrently, the
Airplane Division of the National Defense Advisory Committee (NDAC) reported the expansion that would be necessary to accomplish the president’s plane production
goal. A 200 percent increase in factory floor space and a 400
percent rise in the labor force was needed.5 Private and foreign investment accounted for a modicum of expansion.
But manufacturers, uncertain of the emergency’s length,
were hesitant to borrow money to cover large construction
costs. To facilitate the necessary expansion, the government ultimately provided most of the needed capital. Several aircraft companies received federal money to enlarge
or build new facilities. In addition, War Department and
NDAC officials proposed that the government’s Defense
Plant Corporation finance all new construction to further
increase capacity. These government-owned facilities
would then be rented to private manufacturers. Another
approach suggested that the government build and own
plants, stock them with machines and tools, and engage a
contractor to operate the plant. Such facilities were to become known as government-owned, contractor-operated
(GOCO) plants.6
U.S. Army Air Corps (AAC) administration developed
a plan to build two such GOCO plants. The target production goals were two hundred medium bombers per month
in one factory and one hundred heavy bombers per month
in the other. The AAC chief, General Henry H. Arnold, and
NDAC commissioner, William S. Knudsen, decided these
plants should be built in the interior of the country. Increased security was the primary reason for this decision.
The second was the government’s desire to distribute the
economic benefits of plant construction and operation as
widely as possible. Since the majority of the nation’s aircraft plants were on the coasts, locating new capacity in the
interior could draw upon new sources of labor, power,
transportation, and the like.7
A Plant Site Board traveled to several locations in the
Midwest. In the autumn of 1940 the board finished its sur-
5. Irving Brinton Holley Jr., United States Army in World War II, Special Studies: Buying Aircraft: Materiel Procurement for the Army Air Forces
(Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1989), 293.
6. Ibid., 294–301.
7. Wesley F. Craven and James L. Cate, eds., The Army Air Forces in
World War II: VI. Men and Planes (Washington, D.C.: Office of Air Force
History, 1983), 311.
KANSAS HISTORY
The December 7, 1940, Kansas City Times, announces that Kansas City will be home to one of the government’s warplane assembly plants.
veys and forwarded them to General Arnold, who then
conferred with Commissioner Knudsen. They selected
Omaha, Nebraska, as the location to build the Martin B-26
two-engine plane; the Consolidated B-24 four-engine assembly was to take place in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Upon further study and reflection, however, officials decided more
sites were needed. The demand “threatened to impose an
impossible strain on the local resources” of Omaha and
Tulsa alone, so AAC and NDAC officials recommended
two more GOCO plants.8 Fort Worth, Texas, would help
make the B-24, and Kansas City, Kansas, would produce
the B-25 two-engine bomber. A front-page headline in the
Kansas City Times of December 7, 1940, read “BIG BOMBER
PLANT FOR CITY.” The plant was to be operated by
North American Aviation.9
The AAC’s chosen plant site was in the extreme northeast part of Kansas City. The area, known as Fairfax Industrial District, comprised light industrial and agricultural
manufacturing. The specific construction site was a seventy-five-acre alfalfa field adjoining Fairfax Airport, a privately owned airport with two asphalt runways. North
American’s president, James H. Kindelberger, noted in a
telegram: “Have inspected Fairfax site and it is okay. Airport small but suitable for immediate needs with improvements.”10 Prompt action allowed survey work to began in
December 1940, and in January 1941 the War Department
and North American signed the necessary contracts.
Muskogee Iron Works of Muskogee, Oklahoma, won the
bid to supply approximately five thousand tons of structural steel. In February the Kansas City, Kansas, government purchased Fairfax Airport, which satisfied an AAC
requirement for free use of the airport to test the completed bombers. The federal government subsequently financed airport improvements to accommodate such testing.11 From its Inglewood, California, headquarters and
home plant, North American submitted a preliminary list
of needed equipment and machinery for Kansas City. Federal officials bought just over eighty-five acres from the
Kansas City Industrial Land Company, which constituted
the land for the plant and the right-of-way between the site
and the airport.12
The groundbreaking ceremony occurred on March 8,
1941. Kindelberger and Kansas governor Payne Ratner
were among more than five thousand participants and
8. Holley, United States Army in World War II, 306–8.
9. General Arnold to Assistant Secretary of War Patterson, November 27, 1940, Materiel Division, Colonel A. J. Lyon Project Files 1939–1941,
Book 48, Government Owned Factories, RG 18, National Archives, Washington, D.C.; “Big Bomber Plant For City,” Kansas City Times, December 7,
1940.
10. James H. Kindelberger telegram to unidentified, December 2,
1940, Lyon Project Files.
11. General Brett to Don C. McCombs, February 6, 1941, ibid.; “Vote
For Fairfax,” Kansas City Times, February 12,1941.
12. “Fairfax Acres To US,” Kansas City Star, February 27, 1941.
“WE ALL HAD A CAUSE”
247
spectators in attendance.13 Within days the first graders,
tractors, and pile drivers arrived on site, and fifty men
started work. The firm of McDonald, Tarleton, and Patti of
Saint Louis and Kansas City won the general contractor
bid and shared responsibility for the construction with the
U. S. Army Corps of Engineers. A Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, firm was awarded the contract for sheet steel for the
roof and sidewalls. By the end of March the initial foundation piles were driven and being filled with concrete, and
the first structural steel began to arrive.
Washington approved the list of machines and production equipment and assigned a high priority to the procurement.14 By April workmen were using five pile drivers;
they poured concrete caps atop the piling clusters, which
set the foundation lines, and started the concrete walls.
They laid the floor with sand, then gravel, and finished
with a top layer of reinforced concrete. At this time approximately four hundred men were on the job constructing the plant.
The factory superstructure would comprise fourteen
single-story bays of 50-foot width and 1,050-foot length,
along with a final assembly bay 32 feet high, 200 feet wide,
and 750 feet in length. On April 7, 1941, the crew erected
the first structural steel, and within a week they had assembled two bays and part of a third. By month’s end the
13. “Hail Air Place,” ibid., March 8, 1941.
14. “Speed Up Plant Tools,” ibid., March 29, 1941.
248
skeleton of ten bays was complete, and sheet steel workers
began to deck the roof.15 In May construction of the last of
the fourteen standard-width bays and the final assembly
bay began.
That same month Kindelberger stated that the first aircraft parts from California, where B-25 assembly was already under way, were being prepared for shipment. H. V.
Schwalenberg, the newly appointed Kansas plant manager, announced that a dozen key men from North American
in California would arrive soon to facilitate the start of operations. An additional 140 skilled men were training as
supervisors and also were slated to join the Kansas City
staff. At the end of June 1941 the plant was approximately
70 percent complete, and the awaited parts began to arrive.
The AAC and North American signed contract W535 AC
19341 for the purchase of 1,200 B-25D aircraft. The D suffix
denoted planes to be built in Kansas City.16
In early July North American employees began constructing jigs—frames into which individual pieces are
joined together to make a plane’s component parts in a
prompt, consistent manner. Also in July plant construction
crews completed the structural steel erection, and began to
15. “Bomber Steel Up,” ibid., April 7, 1941; “Speed Up On Big Plant,”
ibid., April 22, 1941; “Air Plant Tempo Gains,” ibid., April 30, 1941.
16. W. F. Volandt to General Echols, June 28, 1941, 452.1 Airplanes:
Bombers, Central Decimal Files 1939–1942, RG 18, National Archives;
“Bomber Parts In,” Kansas City Star, June 26, 1941.
KANSAS HISTORY
(Left) Plans for the “Bomber Assembly ‘City’” appeared in a February
1941 issue of the Kansas City Star,
and a groundbreaking ceremony for
the Kansas City plant was held
March 8, 1941.
(Right) By the summer of 1941, with
the plant 70 percent completed, the
first B-25D aircraft were under construction. Pictured here is ongoing
production in the final assembly bay,
ca. 1942.
fit large sliding doors in the north end and east wall of the
final assembly bay.17 The completed aircraft could be rolled
out these doors in preparation for initial flight tests. The
AAC now controlled Fairfax Airport under a fifty-year
lease with the local government; construction crews were
enlarging and improving the airport. When the work was
finished, the field contained four concrete runways, each
150 feet wide with a mean length of 5,725 feet.18
Construction workers, now numbering nearly five
hundred, completed the sheet steel siding and connected
underground electrical service. In September they hung
fluorescent lighting and completed the first major jig. Subcontractors gradually installed equipment and machinery
in the large plant.19 Auto companies joined the airplane industry by making some parts and sub-assemblies; Fisher
Body of General Motors, primarily the Memphis, Tennessee, division, supplied the Kansas City plant. In midOctober 1941 the plant was 91 percent complete, and AAF
representatives moved into their offices.20 Three B-25s were
17. “In Bomber Plant,” Kansas City Star, July 7, 1941; “Big Plant’s
Doors Up,” ibid., July 13, 1941.
18. “Fairfax To Army,” Kansas City Times, June 7, 1941; “Rush Big Fairfax,” Kansas City Star, June 18, 1941; “Runways at Fairfax Almost Done,”
Kansas City Kansan, May 24, 1942; North Ameri-Kansan, April 28, 1944.
19. “Move Plane Tools In,” Kansas City Star, September 25, 1941.
20. “A Bomber Part Start,” Kansas City Times, October 16, 1941; Aircraft Expansion Program: Recap of Essential Facilities Data, October 15,
1941, 004.4, Firms and Factories, box 65, Central Decimal Files 1939–1942.
In June 1941 the Army Air Corps reorganized as the Army Air Forces.
in production in November, the principal assemblies for
which had been shipped from Inglewood. Employees of
North American’s Kansas division then numbered about
six hundred and were expected to increase to ten thousand
when production reached its peak.21
Built as a “blackout “ building, the plant had no windows, and steel canopies and a one-foot-thick concrete
wall sheltered its doors. One-foot-thick concrete formed
the curtain walls as well. The exterior paint, roof treatment,
and concrete apron color were designed to blend into the
landscape. Floor space was more than one million square
feet, and unlike most buildings of the time, it was air-conditioned. The complex also comprised five small ancillary
structures, such as a power house and police quarters. The
government’s cost for the materials, labor, equipment, and
machinery totaled well over eleven million dollars.22
In August 1941 Kindelberger had announced that the
plant dedication would take place when the first bomber
was completed, which he had expected to occur at the end
of the year. Officials planned an elaborate three-day dedication to start on January 9, 1942, including an open house
where thousands were expected to attend. But these plans
21. “Bomber Tide Near,” Kansas City Star, November 14, 1941.
22. North American Skyline 2 (October 1941): 9, 35; Aircraft Expansion
Program: Recap of Essential Facilities Data, January 1, 1942, 004.4, Firms
and Factories, box 65, Central Decimal Files 1939–1942.
“WE ALL HAD A CAUSE”
249
On December 8, 1941, the
day following the attack
on Pearl Harbor, hundreds
of local residents lined up
to join the work force at
the Kansas City plant. By
the autumn of 1943 employment had reached
23,500.
changed soon after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor,
December 7, 1941, and U.S. entry into the war. Officials
thought it best to focus on production, so a conservative
ceremony was held on December 23, 1941, to mark completion of the first bomber to roll from the plant.23 The first
test flight occurred on January 3, 1942.
A
t the beginning of 1942 the plant had 1,358 employees.24 A number of these were skilled workers
who had been transferred from the North American plant in California, and another small group had attended private aviation schools, but the majority of the employees were local and had just received training. The
school districts of Kansas City, Kansas, and Kansas City,
Missouri, already had been offering national defense training courses on a small scale before the area was granted
the bomber plant. Following the announcement, the districts asked the company how to prepare people for employment. The employment and personnel directors from
Inglewood outlined equipment needs for training, and
both school boards requested and received funds to purchase the necessary machinery. Training to prepare men
for employment at the bomber plant began at two schools
in May 1941. In Missouri students met at the then Manual
23. “Hail Bomber No. 1,” Kansas City Times, December 24, 1941.
24. North American Aviation, Inc.: A Brief History of the B-25 Mitchell
Bomber (Dayton, Ohio: U.S. Air Force Museum), 29.
250
High and Vocational School; the Kansas classes utilized the
old Sumner High School building at Ninth and Washington, later known as the National Defense Training School.25
The local school districts offered training classes in
basic aircraft sheet metal work. Funded by the federal government, the classes were free to students except for the
purchase of a small toolkit. Men wanting to take the class
had first to apply to their state employment office. If they
passed a battery of tests, the candidates went on for an interview. Satisfactory interviews allowed them to enroll in
the twelve-week course, and those who successfully completed the course were referred to North American. Classes in other areas of aircraft production were added later. In
July 1941 eight experienced men had come from North
American to join the instructor staff and to guide curriculum at the two training schools. By August five hundred
men were being instructed in the Kansas school and about
two hundred at the Missouri site.26 The graduates of this
early training took their place among the ranks of those
who first staffed the plant. In those early days only men
eighteen to thirty-five years of age were considered for employment in aircraft construction, but employment policies
25. “To Assist in Starting Plane Class,” Kansas City Kansan, May 22,
1941; “A Bomber School Start,” Kansas City Times, May 26, 1941. Sumner
High School and its African American students moved into a new facility at 1610 North Eighth (Eighth and Oakland) in 1940.
26. “Get Ready For Machine Tool Classes,” Kansas City Kansan, August 21, 1941; “Air Skill Spurt,” Kansas City Star, July 7, 1941.
KANSAS HISTORY
The first completed B-25D
bomber prepares for its test
flight, January 3, 1942. Note the
plant employees gathered to witness the event.
changed as the war called more and more men into the
armed forces.
As the first of Kansas City’s B-25s emerged from the
Fairfax plant, the North American B-25 bomber appeared
in headlines worldwide, as a result of an intrepid mission.
A number of AAF crews, led by Lieutenant Colonel James
H. Doolittle, had trained with B-25s in short takeoffs and
low level flying. On April 18, 1942, Doolittle’s unit took off
from the carrier USS Hornet, attacked targets in Tokyo and
three other Japanese cities, and continued its flight west.
They barely reached the Asian mainland; several
crewmembers were injured, killed, or captured; and all sixteen B-25s were lost. Although the daring raid inflicted
only minor physical damage on the enemy, the direct strike
on the Japanese empire demonstrated that the enemy’s
homeland was vulnerable, and it lifted American morale.27
Meanwhile, back in the Midwest, the B-25 earned a
new name—the Mitchell, for aviation proponent General
William “Billy” Mitchell. But production moved slowly.
During the first four months of 1942, the AAF accepted
eleven planes from the Kansas plant.28 It took time to coa-
27. Wesley F. Craven and James L. Cate, eds., The Army Air Forces in
World War II: I. Plans and Early Operations, January 1939 to August 1942
(Washington, D.C.: Office of Air Force History, 1983), 438–44.
28. Tom Lilley, et al., Problems of Accelerating Aircraft Production During World War II (Boston: Harvard University, 1947), 97. James Kindelberger suggested the new name, which was widely adopted.
lesce a new work force and to receive the remainder of the
machinery orders. In addition, assemblers encountered
early Fisher Body parts that did not fit and thus required
rework. These teething issues delayed aircraft production
and acceptances.29 Nonetheless the Fairfax flight line was
teeming with B-25s undergoing alterations. Early operational reports necessitated the modification of some
Mitchells to meet the special circumstances and needs of
their end-users. Certain equipment or armament was
added, removed, or exchanged, and special preparations
for specific weather destinations were accomplished.
Other changes prepared aircraft bound for service with allies, such as the British and Russians. Because such alterations could not reasonably be effected in the just-started
assembly process, they were performed on a select number
of aircraft after their initial test flights. Many planes on the
flight line had been built in Inglewood and flown to
Kansas City for these modifications.30
In May 1942 work started on the foundation of a modification center—a dual hangar to be built on the southeast
edge of Fairfax Airport expressly for facilitating aircraft alterations. Because construction workers needed steel for
military items, timber frames were largely used in the con-
29. Robert Gibler, interview by author, June 20, 1989; Don Calkins,
interview by author, September 22, 1989.
30. “Army Air Forces Historical Study 62: The Modification of Army
A/C in the United States,” Reference Collection 1090, 20–26, National
Archives.
“WE ALL HAD A CAUSE”
251
The initial final assembly bay at
the Kansas City plant can be seen
here stretching out behind the
central entrance. The high bay,
completed in March 1943, is just
visible at the top right.
struction of the center. By October workers completed the
modification center, but the ever increasing volume of
work meant that some alterations continued to be performed outdoors on the airport apron.31 Subsequently a
west extension and several outbuildings were added to the
modification center.
Yet another significant plan involving North American’s Kansas City facility commenced in 1942. The Boeing
B-29—a new, long-range, heavy bomber—was destined to
be an important weapon in the Pacific theater. A consortium, which included Boeing Aircraft Company, set up a
committee to plan for the new plane’s production, and several companies contracted to build the B-29. In addition to
North American Aviation; Boeing of Wichita; Bell Aircraft
of Marietta, Georgia; and Glenn L. Martin in Omaha, Nebraska, received such contracts. Charged with building
two hundred planes, North American decided that the
Kansas City plant could produce the B-29 in conjunction
with the Mitchell. In July an addition for this purpose was
begun on the east side of the bomber plant. Because the
new bomber was appreciably larger than the B-25, the addition needed to be expansive. The “high bay,” as it was
known, added 370,000 square feet of floor space. It measured 350 feet wide and 1,060 feet in length; the height was
twice that of the existing, final assembly bay.
31. North American Aviation, Inc.: A Brief History of the B-25 Mitchell
Bomber, 30–31.
252
With the high bay construction under way, and much
of the B-29 engineering and equipment procurement in
progress, the AAF reversed its earlier decision. A memo
from Major General Oliver P. Echols to General Henry H.
Arnold read in part: “Since the B-25 has apparently become
a more useful plane than was anticipated, in that it not only
seems to be a reasonably good medium bomber, but also,
with gunnery modifications, will lend itself to support of
ground troops. It is believed that circumstances will require the maximum number of these planes that we can
build.”32 As a result the AAF cancelled North American’s B29 contract but continued the plant addition and tool orders, with the plan to increase B-25 production. The plant
addition was completed in March 1943, and by that summer the high bay was incorporated into the assembly
process.33
Meanwhile, B-29 production shifted to the Boeing
plant in Renton, Washington, but the bombers also were
built in three other locations, including Wichita, which produced the largest number. The AAF accepted its first B-29
in July 1943, and in total accepted 1,634 pre-series and pro-
32. Ibid., 28; Major General Echols to General Arnold, June 26, 2942,
Series II, box 163, Central Decimal Files 1939–1942. The navy also had requested nine hundred B-25s.
33. Skyline 4 (July–August 1943): 10–11. See also http://www.boeing.com/history/boeing/b29.html.
KANSAS HISTORY
duction planes combined. Kansas historian Craig Miner
called the wartime statistics for Boeing-Wichita “staggering.” The company’s Plant II, where B-29s were manufactured,
originally estimated to cost $17.5 million, eventually
absorbed nearly $27 million of taxpayers’ money.
Tools and fixtures inside were worth $20 million. By
the end of the war Boeing-Wichita had 3,000,000
square feet of production and storage space . . . and
the largest steel trusses ever fabricated (300 ft. long,
128 tons each) spanning the final assembly bays.
The plant’s utility usage and costs were phenomenal,
and its
cafeteria was the biggest restaurant in Kansas. . . .
Peak employment in December 1943 at Boeing–Wichita was 29,795. . . . The company had a golf course,
a baseball league, bowling alleys, a private lake,
shopping centers and a housing development. Truly
it was a city within a city, and by itself ranked as one
of the major population centers of the region.34
As previously noted, the first six B-25s completed at
the Kansas City plant had come from Inglewood in major
assembly form. The next ninety-four planes were in various stages of assembly and were shipped to the Kansas
City plant or to Fisher Body, but the completed assemblies
were finalized at Kansas City. Starting with shipment 101,
workers performed approximately 45 percent of the manufacture at Kansas City, with Fisher Body and other subcontractors completing the remainder. Problems in receiving machined parts of sufficient quality and quantity
caused North American to shift more of the fabrication to
the Kansas division. As it evolved, the bomber plant undertook approximately 62 percent of the manufacture.
Fisher Body’s contribution would average 29 percent, including such parts as outer wing panels and fuselage side
panels. The remaining content was composed of government furnished equipment, such as engines, propellers,
wheels, tires, and instruments. What had started as a sim-
34. Craig Miner, “The War Years in Wichita,” in Paul K. Stuewe, ed.,
Kansas Revisited: Historical Images and Perspectives (Lawrence: Division of
Continuing Education, University of Kansas, 1990), 269; www.boeing.
com/history/boeing/b29.html. Boeing–Renton built more than 1,100 B29 bombers, Bell Aircraft Co. (Georgia) built 668, and Glenn L. Martin Co.
(Nebraska) built 536.
ple assembly plant had grown into a veritable manufacturing facility.35
I
n November 1942 eighty-five B-25s rolled out of the
Kansas City facility. By this time plant workers were
no longer only young men, as the draft and voluntary
enlistments had depleted this demographic. Employment
opportunities had opened for older men and women, once
officials recognized they would be needed to fill the many
vacated positions. Women first entered bomber plant jobs
in the offices and storerooms, but production classes
opened to them as early as March 1942. Classes were offered at the two principal training schools, along with several other sites, such as then Argentine High School in
Kansas City, Kansas, and Lathrop Defense Training Center
in Kansas City, Missouri. Among the subjects offered were
basic aircraft sheet metal work, blueprint reading, and
shop math. By autumn 1942 women held 27 percent of the
jobs at the Kansas City plant.36 They could be found
preparing electrical cables, installing fuel lines and carburetors, testing propeller governors, and assembling and
cleaning machine guns, among other assignments. A November newspaper item noted that thirty-nine grandmothers worked in the plant, office, or cafeteria. By the
end of the year women also were working at the modification center, and the bomber plant’s already nontraditional
work force was being augmented by deaf and blind individuals, whom supervisors often placed in electrical assembly or sheet metal work.37
In 1941 blues artist Josh White recorded the following
lyrics in the song “Defense Factory Blues.”
“Went to the De-fense factory
Trying to find some work to do,
Had the nerve to tell me,
‘Black boy, Nothing here for you.”
35. “History of North American Aviation Inc. of Kansas: (Government Assembly Plant No. 2) Kansas City Kansas, June 1941 to 31 October
1943,” appendix to Army Air Forces Material Command: History of the Midwestern Procurement District, 1943, 6–9, 204.4–2 , U.S. Air Force Collection,
U.S.A.F. Historical Research Center, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama;
North American Aviation, Inc.: A Brief History of the B-25 Mitchell Bomber, 27,
28.
36. Lilley, Problems of Accelerating Aircraft Production During World
War II, 97; North Ameri-Kansan, March 20, 1942; “Women In Draft Wake,”
Kansas City Star, October 11, 1942.
37. North Ameri-Kansan, November 27, 1942; ibid., October 2, 1942;
ibid., October 23, 1942; ibid., November 27, 1942.
“WE ALL HAD A CAUSE”
253
The song’s racial message was all too familiar throughout
the nation. African American laborers, to say the least,
were underutilized at the Kansas City plant, as elsewhere.
Before the first training began, Kindelberger had announced that “Negroes will be considered only as janitors
and in other similar capacities.”38 Management provided
no plan for their employment as aircraft production workers. In fact, according to the Kansas City Star, Kindelberger
“emphasized that under no circumstances would Negroes
be employed as aircraft workers or mechanics in the
plant.” Ironically, the building being used to train white
aircraft workers at Ninth and Washington was the former
home of the city’s African American high school. Kindelberger’s position, of course, drew criticism. The mayor of
Kansas City, Kansas, wrote to ask Kindelberger to reconsider his policy. In Congress Representative U. S. Guyer
and Senator Arthur Capper, both from Kansas, protested
North American’s employment plan. Approximately thirty-five hundred African Americans met in Kansas City,
Kansas’s, Memorial Hall to protest and to discuss a course
of action. One of the meeting’s principal speakers, Kansas
City Call editor C. A. Franklin, stated, “The Kindelberger
attitude is at cross purposes with the democracy we are all
seeking to defend.39
The Kansas City situation was a reflection of a national scene. African American labor organizer A. Philip Randolph was determined to confront defense industry discrimination and to do so he called for a march on
Washington. The plan was to gather ten thousand demonstrators in the nation’s capital to call attention to unfair
labor practice and to specifically appeal for defense jobs,
since they were under federal contracts. Randolph set July
1, 1941, as the march date. Concerned about a revised estimate that put the number at one hundred thousand
demonstrators and that the march would expose American
injustice to the world, President Roosevelt met with the activist leaders on June 18; they maintained that only a concrete measure could cause cancellation of the march. The
president appointed a committee to find a solution, and its
recommendations resulted in Executive Order 8802, issued
on June 25, 1941. It established “that there shall be no dis-
38. Joshua White, “Best Of Blues: 1936–1941,” Wolf Records, Marr
Sound Archives, University of Missouri – Kansas City; “Limit Negro Air
Jobs,” Kansas City Star, March 17, 1941.
39. “Capper and Guyer Hit Bomber Plant Policy on Negroes,” Kansas
City Kansan, March 21, 1941; “3,500 At Negro Meeting ,” Kansas City Times,
March 31, 1941.
254
crimination in the employment of workers in defense industries or government because of race, creed, color, or national origin.” The order also set up the Fair Employment
Practices Committee to investigate discrimination complaints.40
Subsequently, so as not to risk the loss of their lucrative federal contract, North American’s Kansas management agreed to hire “non-white” workers in accordance to
their percentage of the population, or 10 percent in the
Kansas City metropolitan area. Accordingly, some African
Americans were allowed to train for and assume production jobs over the course of the bomber plant’s operation.
In October 1943 a War Manpower Commission survey reported that African Americans constituted 5.5 percent of
North American’s Kansas division’s labor force; almost
half had jobs in Department 47—Service and Janitors. Although the survey acknowledged that North American
“employs a high percentage of non-white workers compared to many employers in the Greater Kansas City area,”
it went on to state that North American’s hiring performance “is inconsistent with the extent of such workers’
availability in the immediate labor market area and indicates failure to comply with fair employment standards.”41
As late as March 1944 African Americans constituted only
6 percent of the Kansas division’s labor force. But 1940s
America was still a largely segregated society, and faced
with ever increasing production needs, the government
did not enforce full compliance in all industries and geographic regions. At best, the government measures tempered defense work discrimination. “Regardless of the
state of supply, an industry which before the war had employed few Negroes . . . was not likely to increase to any
great extent its proportion of Negro workers or to train
them for better jobs.”42
40. Bryan Fairchild and Jonathan Grossman, U. S. Army In World War
II: The War Department, The Army, and Industrial Manpower (Washington,
D.C.: Office of the Chief of Military History, 1959), 156–59; Andrew E. Kersten, Race, Jobs, and the War: The FEPC in the Midwest, 1941–46 (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2000), 9–20. For text of Executive Order
8802, see “Presidential Executive Orders, Executive Order 8802,”
http://www.eeoc.gov/abouteeoc/35th/thelaw/eo-8802.html.
41. Plant Composition and Manpower Utilization Survey, North
American Aviation Inc. of Kansas, October 1943, Office of the Regional Director, Kansas City, Missouri, Manpower Utilization Surveys and Case
Histories, 1943–1945, 535.2, box 119, RG 211, National Archives, Central
Plains Region, Kansas City, Mo.
42. Kansas City Regional Office memo 3/30/44, Eva C. Vaughn file,
Regional Files, Kansas City Closed Cases, box 18, RG 228, National
Archives, Central Plains Region; Fairchild and Grossman, The Army and
Industrial Manpower, 168.
KANSAS HISTORY
Production classes opened to
women in March 1942, but when
operations accelerated in 1943,
women were especially encouraged
to join the work force. By autumn
of that year females on the payroll
numbered 9,125, which was 39
percent of total employment at the
Kansas City plant.
Although North American remained reticent in the hiring of minorities, its production schedules were slated to
accelerate in 1943, and the company welcomed other nontraditional laborers. It especially invited women to its training centers. Course lengths were shortened to six weeks.
Eighteen had been considered the minimum age for a
bomber plant job, but now boys aged sixteen and seventeen
became eligible for work there. An added incentive to all,
men and women, was that now trainees were paid while
they learned, sixty cents per hour, which was the starting
pay at the plant.
Women also received general encouragement to work
in defense plants through a popular icon. Redd Evans and
John J. Loeb’s song “Rosie the Riveter” described the valuable contribution a woman could make to the war effort. J.
Howard Miller further emphasized the message with his
depiction of Rosie, with the slogan “We Can Do It!”
Whether the effective appeal came from the War Manpower Commission, a song, a poster, or a simple determination
to contribute to the war effort, they responded. Women, of
course, had begun to perform production jobs at the Fairfax
plant in early 1942. By the autumn of 1943 females on the
payroll numbered 9,125, which was 39 percent of total division employment; they were working in ninety-eight of the
one hundred departments. At peak employment women
constituted 40 percent of the work force at Martin-Omaha
and actually reached 50 percent at Boeing-Wichita. This mobilization mirrored the national trend. At the end of 1941
approximately 4,000 women worked in America’s aircraft
plants, excluding office and nonfactory jobs; by the middle
of 1943 the number had risen to more than 310,000, which
equaled 39 percent of the airframe industry labor force.43
Other factors also affected production. In January 1943
absenteeism averaged 8.2 percent, resulting in lost productivity. North American started a program offering free war
bonds to employees in departments with best attendance.
This program soon gave way to periodic slogan contests;
cash prizes were awarded for the best patriotic slogans that
stressed the importance of being on the job. A gradual decrease of the absentee rate seems to have been the result: it
fell to 5.2 percent in June. A greater problem, perhaps, were
the ten-hour shifts, six-days per week, which caused worker fatigue, left little time for personal matters, and exacerbated transportation difficulties. In October 1943 North
American management responded by introducing a new
work schedule. Two shifts worked five days per week, ten
hours per day, with a periodic weekday off. B-25 production kept to schedule, and the absentee rate continued to
drop; by early 1945, it averaged 3.2 percent.44
43. Fairchild and Grossman, The Army and Industrial Manpower, 173;
Plant Composition and Manpower Utilization Survey, RG 211. For more
on Wichita, see Judith Johnson, “Uncle Sam Wanted Them Too! Women
Aircraft Workers in Wichita During World War II,” Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains 17 (Spring 1994): 38–49; Miner, “The War Years in
Wichita,” 269.
44. North Ameri-Kansan, January 15, 1943; ibid., February 26, 1943;
ibid., October 1, 1943; ibid., February 2, 1945.
“WE ALL HAD A CAUSE”
255
C
onserving resources also became critical at the
Kansas City plant. Workers substituted wood for
stainless steel in making pilots’ and co-pilots’ seats.
Stamped scraps of aluminum sheet took the place of smaller needed pieces. Stray rivets and other fasteners that had
been simply discarded were now collected from the floor
and reused or recycled. Supervisors encouraged employees
to submit suggestions that would expedite production or
save materials. By war’s end, division management had accepted 2,307 ideas, improving plant and modification center operations, and netting the suggestors various amounts
in war bonds and stamps.45
Shop safety, a point of vital importance, appeared in
such poster slogans as “The Eyes Have It! Goggles Keep
‘em That Way.” During approximately four years of operations, only one production-related death occurred in the
Fairfax plant and modification center: an electric lamp was
thrust into a fuel tank rich with coating vapors, and the
tank exploded, killing a female worker.46
In the autumn of 1943 employment reached its highest
point with approximately 23,500 workers in both the plant
and modification center. The higher employment and the
additional machinery originally procured for the B-29 plant
increased the productive capacity. In 1943 B-25 production
started with January’s output of 90, increased steadily each
month for the most part, and ended with the manufacture
of 190 in December. For the year the Kansas plant’s total of
1,701 eclipsed Inglewood’s production. Besides the planes
for the AAF, British, and Russians, the staff at the modification center also prepared B-25s for the U. S. Navy (issued
primarily to the U.S. Marines) and the Dutch. A number of
the AAF planes were even fitted with a seventy-five millimeter cannon in the nose. A flight hangar was built north
of the high bay, where planes received gun and turret installations, and two concrete enclosures were built along
the Missouri River levee for test firing machine guns.47
North American employees received some perhaps unexpected benefits. Early in the war the Japanese gained control of vast oil and rubber resources, thereby affecting
American supply and compelling the federal government
to ration items such as gasoline and automobile tires. Since
45. Ibid., August 10, 1945.
46. “War Plant Blast Fatal,” Kansas City Times, December 3, 1943.
47. North American Aviation, Inc.: A Brief History of the B-25 Mitchell
Bomber, 25; Lilley, Problems of Accelerating Aircraft Production During World
War II, 97. Sand filled the enclosures to absorb the bullets, and periodically it had to be replaced because the firing pulverized the sand into a
fine powder.
256
those involved in defense work were accorded a certain priority, North American was able to assist employees in obtaining necessary fuel and tires. But the company also asked
employees to do more for the war effort than make airplanes. Workers were encouraged to buy war bonds, give
blood to the Red Cross, and donate money and clothing for
relief organizations serving those in war-ravaged countries.
North American issued two employee publications.
The North Ameri-Kansan, a weekly plant newspaper, reported general employee news, training opportunities, social
events, and sports activities. The news, however, was not
always good.
Sympathy is felt for Jasper J. Griffin (Dept. 37, nights)
who has taken a leave of absence until February 10.
Two of his sons were recently killed in Italy.
This week Ruby Kullman (Dept. 34) received a memorial tribute and a Purple Heart certificate for her husband, Pfc. Victor W. Kullman, an infantryman, who
was killed in France.
Pvt. Jack Layton of the 4th Marine Division, 18-yearold son of Mrs. Florence Layton (Dept. 70) was killed
on Iwo Jima Feb. 20. He was a former employee of
Dept. 17.48
The second, bi-monthly publication, Skyline, centered on
North American’s big picture. It contained major company
news, described business and operational procedures, and
offered articles concerning the three plants (the third plant
operated in Dallas, Texas). The antics of cartoon character
Willie Wingflap and his friend Poindexter provided humor.
The year 1944 brought the beginning of the end for the
Axis powers, but the B-25 work continued. The AAF’s
345th Bombardment Group, then equipped solely with B25Ds, was proving the model’s effectiveness. At that time
the unit operated over New Guinea and surrounding areas.
Its attacks on Japanese airfields forced the enemy to vacate
one base after another, limiting in stages enemy air presence in the fighting zone.49
In November 1943 Harold R. Raynor became the
Kansas division’s new plant manager. He oversaw the
48. North Ameri-Kansan, January 14, 1944; ibid., January 5, 1945; ibid.,
April 13, 1945.
49. Lawrence J. Hickey, Warpath Across the Pacific: The Illustrated History of the 345th Bombardment Group during World War II (Boulder, Colo.:
International Research and Publishing, 1984), 118–21.
KANSAS HISTORY
In March 1944 the last
B-25D was built, and
production began on a
new model. On this final
B-25D, photographed here,
employees taped money
and paychecks to the plane,
raising more than nine
thousand dollars, which
was given to Army and
Navy Relief.
largest production achievement of the plant’s existence. In
1944 the Kansas City plant produced 3,012 B-25s, an average of 251 per month.50
Under Raynor’s leadership North American implemented several methods to reach these impressive production rates. Engineers applied sub-assemblies, an assembled
unit designed to be incorporated with other units, to the
Mitchell. Five sections—front, center, rear fuselage, wings,
and empennage—were broken down into assemblies, split
into sub-assemblies, and further divided into component
parts. The employees, therefore, built the planes from the
simplest level to the complex whole. The progressive sequence of operations increased production. Since much of
the work force was new, with little training or experience,
North American put much effort into work simplification.
Each task was broken down into a number of jobs, and
each employee or crew was trained to perform a specific
job or jobs. Thus, workers learned their jobs more quickly
and were more promptly effective. Throughout the production process inspectors verified the suitability of the
work before passing it to the next stage; at times the deficiency was marked and a rework crew corrected it in the
following stage. This quality control was two-tiered, North
American, then AAF. During the war American aircraft
firms utilized these and associated methods to attain the
production records.51
In March 1944 the last of the B-25D models moved
down the assembly line, and production began on a new
model. The B-25J incorporated several improvements.
Armor protection was added for the cockpit, and the bottom turret was no longer installed, for it had proven too
slow and awkward to operate in combat. The top turret was
moved forward to give more front firepower. Package machine guns were added below the cockpit, four on each
side. Some J models received a solid nose instead of the
glass enclosure nose; in this solid nose eight machine guns
were placed, making a possible total of eighteen machine
guns per plane.
Effective July 7, 1944, North American ceased production of the B-25 at the Inglewood plant and focused on
building the P-51 fighter. Its Dallas facility also was primarily involved in the production of the P-51 as well as the AT6 trainer. Thus, from mid-1944 the Kansas City plant was
the sole source of B-25s.52 Since the plant operation was running at such a high pitch, modifications were incorporated
into the assembly process. As a result, the modification center was closed in October, and thereafter it was used as an
adjunct to the final assembly line.
50. Lilley, Problems of Accelerating Aircraft Production During
World War II, 97.
51. Skyline 4 (July-August 1943): 10, 11; Lilley, Problems of Accelerating
Aircraft Production During World War II, 40, 41.
52. “Leads In Bomber,” Kansas City Times, July 7, 1944.
“WE ALL HAD A CAUSE”
257
Employees gather at the Kansas
City plant to receive the
Army–Navy E Award, given to
them on October 6, 1944, for excellence in production.
On October 6, 1944, the Kansas City plant received the
Army–Navy E award for excellence in production. The
plant’s success was emblematic of the American aircraft industry’s achievement during World War II. President Roosevelt had appealed for 50,000 planes per year; in 1944 U.S.
production totaled 96,318 warplanes.53 A 1947 study of
World War II aircraft production observed the following
about the work force building these planes:
Many were housewives, farmers, and employees in
service industries ranging from automobile salesmen
to beauty parlor operators. Particularly in the new
plants constructed in the Middle West, a high percentage of the employees had had no previous experience
in factory work of any kind. The success of the production program is attributable in considerable measure to the ability which these inexperienced men and
women displayed in mastering their completely new
wartime jobs.54
W
hen a completed aircraft left the final assembly
doors, it was ready for flight testing. Considering the volume of flight line activity and number
of test flights, the safety record was excellent—only five significant flying accidents occurred, one of which resulted in
53. “E For War Work,” ibid., October 7, 1944; Holley, United States
Army in World War I, 548.
54. Lilley, Problems of Accelerating Aircraft Production During World
War II, 75.
258
five deaths; one flight line fatality resulted when a ground
worker walked into a whirling propeller.55
Completed planes were assigned to one of a number of
crew chiefs. Each chief had three aircraft in his charge at
most times and three to five mechanics in his crew. They
checked lubricant levels, replaced the engines’ dehydrator
plugs with spark plugs, and inspected principal fasteners.
The engines were then started, and mechanics inspected
carburetor settings, fuel and oil pressures, manifold pressure, engine temperature, and propeller functions. Crews
made adjustments or repairs and monitored engines for
gasoline and oil leaks. Flight line inspectors worked with
the crew to double-check each detail. When all was satisfactory, the flight line foreman was advised, and the test
pilot and crew chief verified correct operation of all control
surfaces—ailerons, elevators, rudders, and trim tabs—and
inspected the landing gear. With engines running, instruments were checked, and the aircraft proceeded to take-off.
A maiden flight lasted about an hour, during which
time the engines, propellers, instruments, controls, and automatic pilot were tested for proper operation. Upon the
plane’s return, the assigned mechanics addressed any problems, or “squawks,” as they were termed. A second flight
was made with the addition of a radio operator. Several maneuvers and operations were conducted, including flight on
55. “Five Die In Crash,” Kansas City Times, April 27, 1942; “Killed By
A Propeller,” Kansas City Star, February 22, 1943.
KANSAS HISTORY
Every completed aircraft underwent a series of checks and inspections before and during its test
flight. All problems were addressed
and repaired before it went up
again for its acceptance flight. This
B-25J bomber, with a standard
bombardier nose, was built at the
Kansas City plant in 1944 – 1945.
one engine. One out of every fifty B-25s was flown to the
Cheyenne Bottoms Gunnery and Bombing Range near
Great Bend to test fire the machine guns in flight. Sometimes
an aircraft would go through a five-hour, high altitude test.
Throughout the flight, “squawks” were recorded and addressed by the responsible crew upon return. Once satisfied,
North American notified the AAF test pilot office. A service
pilot and crew chief then took the plane up for its acceptance
flight before the government actually “bought” it. The plane
was then ready to receive any additional equipment and to
be flown by the ferry command to its destination.56
In January 1945 the Kansas City plant set a production
record: the AAF accepted 315 aircraft, along with 20 sparepart equivalents. For the next three months production remained high while a new venture began. The Lockheed P80 was America’s first operational jet fighter. North
American offered its Kansas City plant to augment Lockheed’s production, and the War Department approved. In
February 1945 two Lockheed representatives came to
Kansas City to liaison with North American engineering
and production staff, and in April Lockheed shipped a P-80
to the bomber plant for study. While work began on building jigs for the new plane, workmen cleared space for P-80
production in the high bay, and the B-25 assembly line was
56. North Ameri-Kansan, April 14, 1944; Skyline (May–June 1943): 2, 3;
ibid. (September–October 1944): 18-19.
shortened. The test flight office scheduled four pilots to fly
to Lockheed in California to check out on the jet.57
War news overtook the schedule, however. The Germans capitulated on May 7, 1945, and at the end of the
month, the AAF made large cuts in plane production, particularly in short-range types not suited to the Pacific theater. Kansas management received its P-80 cancellation
order and released fifteen hundred employees. The B-25
schedule was expected to be complete in December, therefore average monthly employment gradually dropped for
the first six months of the year. War news again changed
the plans. The Japanese surrendered on August 14, 1945,
and the next day the B-25 contract was terminated.58
In his farewell message to the employees, Harold R.
Raynor said, “Men and women of North American Aviation. The day we have been fighting for since December 7,
1941 has come at last. The world is finally freed of the fear
of aggression and we can now go back to our peacetime
pursuits.”59 At that time North American’s Kansas division
had approximately 7,600 employees. In little more than a
week the firm laid off 4,680. The remaining workers dealt
with paperwork, finished special projects and spare parts
for the AAF, completed work on the planes ready to leave
57. North Ameri-Kansan, August 17, 1945.
58. North American Aviation, Inc.: A Brief History of the B-25 Mitchell
Bomber, 29.
59. North Ameri-Kansan, August 17, 1945.
“WE ALL HAD A CAUSE”
259
Following the end of the war General Motors leased Kansas City’s
former bomber plant and began
manufacturing Buicks, Oldsmobiles, and Pontiacs. Automobile
production continued at this site
until 1987.
final assembly and those on the flight line, and began the
job of preparing the machines, tools, materials, and parts
for disposition.60
The federal government’s Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC) set up a depot in the Fairfax district to sell
machinery, tools, and similar material to peacetime industries and the public and thereby partially recoup the government’s war costs. Some of the bomber plant items were
sent to the depot, while others were transferred for government use elsewhere. Such materials as aluminum sheet
and steel goods went to reclamation centers, and spare airplane parts were dispatched to maintenance depots. Seventy-two incomplete but flyable B-25s were accepted under
the contract and flown elsewhere for sale to the public.
During this demobilization the federal government
classified the plant, modification center, and associated
properties as available for lease. Transcontinental and
Western Air leased the modification center, whose first use
would be in servicing its airliners. On November 7, 1945, it
was announced that General Motors had signed a five-year
lease for the former bomber plant.61 By December 1 the
60. Telegram of War Manpower Commission, August 25, 1945, Office
of the Regional Director, Kansas City, Missouri, Regional Central Files
1943–1945, 533.05/03, Entry 269, box 19, RG 211; “Speed Bomber WindUp,” Kansas City Star, August 24, 1945; “B-25 Tools Out,” Kansas City
Times, September 28, 1945.
61. “TWA to Center,” Kansas City Star, October 24, 1945; “Rush Car
Plant,” ibid., November 7, 1945.
260
plant was essentially cleared of all aircraft production matter, and automobile industry personnel began setting up
shop. In October 1949 the U.S. Air Force terminated its
lease on Fairfax Airport, and the city of Kansas City,
Kansas, regained control of the facility.
The reconverted factory finished its first automobile in
June 1946, and for the next forty or so years it produced
Buicks, Oldsmobiles, and Pontiacs. During the Korean War
the factory was utilized in the dual role of manufacturing
automobiles and F-84 Thunderstreak aircraft.62 In 1960
General Motors purchased the plant. In 1985 the company
announced its plans to build a new auto assembly plant on
the Fairfax Airport property and closed the former airport.
Soon after, the modification center was razed, and automobile production at the former bomber plant ceased in May
1987. In less than two years the building that had been a
setting of such importance during World War II was gone.63
Now only an empty lot remains, although the street sign
nearby stands as a faint reminder, despite its misspelled
designation: Kindleberger Road.
62. George R. Bauer, A Century of Kansas City Aviation History: The
Dreamers and the Doers (N.p.: Historic Preservation Press, 1999), 85.
63. “Fairfax Decision Based on Economics,” Kansas City Times, July
16, 1988; “GM’s Old Fairfax Plant Burns,” Kansas City Star, January 19,
1989.
KANSAS HISTORY
t the start of the war the Axis position of strength,
which had been built from years of rearmament,
resulted in a string of victories. Airpower played a
major role, as evidenced by the Japanese attack on Pearl
Harbor and the sinking of the British warships Prince of
Wales and Repulse; the Luftwaffe’s tactical support of the
German army proved markedly effective in the 1940
blitzkrieg in western Europe. The tide turned as Allied rearmament and manpower steadily drew near and then
eclipsed that of the adversaries. Pilot and crew training and
the production of more and improved types of aircraft facilitated Allied victories, which culminated in the triumph
over the Axis. The B-25 played an important role. It was
flown in every major front of the war and was a vital
weapon of U.S. forces and several of its allies.
When Mitchell production ended in August 1945, 6,608
B-25s had been built in the Kansas City plant, along with
947 spare part equivalents. It is truly a remarkable accomplishment when one considers that “the B-25 contains
165,000 separate parts, not counting 150,000 rivets or the
engines, instruments, and other equipment.”64 Besides the
production total, by war’s end 3,985 airplanes had been serviced at the Fairfax modification center. This work saved
field maintenance personnel, resources, and time, resulting
in the Mitchell’s prompt and effective use against the
enemy.65
Interviews with many Kansas division defense plant
workers reveal two common threads defining their approach to the bomber plant experience: work ethic and patriotism. The employees were “really dedicated to what
they were doing” and “did their best.” Their common goal
was “to beat the Axis.” “We all had a cause to work for,”
and that purpose was simply, “Let’s build these planes and
win this war!”66
North American employees helped accomplish this
and more. After the war most women returned to their
more traditional roles, but the war experience laid the foundation for women’s later advancement into diverse jobs
that previously had been closed to them. African American
gains were incremental, but throughout the nation the civil
rights movement gathered momentum and built upon
wartime changes to realize better the promise of America.
The physically challenged also were given an opportunity
to demonstrate their abilities in the workplace. During the
war the bomber plant was one of the largest production
employers in the Kansas City area; it invigorated the local
economy with more than $160 million in payroll. The employees earned good pay, which was much appreciated in
an America still suffering from the effects of the Great Depression. Of 59,337 total employees, approximately 55,000
had trained for and then garnered valuable work experience at the Fairfax facility.67 These workers gained knowledge and skills that prepared them for many peacetime occupations. The conversion of the Fairfax defense plant to
peacetime use as an automobile manufacturing facility provided a more prosperous life to thousands of workers, and,
of course, benefited the entire metropolitan area.
Finally, North American Aviation, along with Boeing,
Beech Aircraft, and Cessna Aircraft of Wichita, the Kansas
Ordnance Works near Parsons, and Sunflower Ordnance
near Lawrence, had a profound impact on the Kansas economy, labor force, and industrial complex. Together they remade the Sunflower State, giving it a truly mixed economy.
Not only were record numbers of Kansas workers—some
74,500—involved in aircraft manufacture (up from 1,480 in
February 1940), but they were making high wages for the
time. In 1940 such workers averaged $25.01 per week; in
1945 the figure had increased to $55.68. In the state “virtually no one was employed in manufacturing ordnance in
1941; by early 1945 the two plants employed more than
eighteen thousand workers.” In January 1940 Kansas was
home to 447,000 square feet of airframe plants; four year
later it had 6,155,000 square feet.68 North American’s facilities, of course, were converted to different peacetime uses,
but others, such as Wichita’s Cessna and Boeing, remained
major players in America’s aircraft industry. North American’s Kansas division was but part of our state and national history, but it was an important one. North American and
its employees worked together for a common cause and
helped win the war.
64. North Ameri-Kansan, August 17, 1945; Lilley, Problems of Accelerating Aircraft Production During World War II, 37.
65. AAF Historical Study 62, Statistics.
66. Concha Macias, interview by author, July 26, 1988; Ralph Marshall, interview by author, May 1, 1989; Roy Corriston, interview by author, October 15, 1988; Lillian Shaver, interview by author, September 18,
1989; Edward Roebuck, interview by author, July 15, 1988.
67. “Contribution to Peace,” Kansas City Star, August 19, 1945.
68. Peter Fearon, “Ploughshares into Airplanes: Manufacturing Industry and Workers in Kansas During World War II,” Kansas History: A
Journal of the Central Plains 22 (Winter 1999/2000): 300–2; William Glenn
Cunningham, The Aircraft Industry: A Study in Industrial Location (Los Angeles: Lorrin L. Morrison, 1951), 203–9, 213.
A
“WE ALL HAD A CAUSE”
261